Simultaneous characterization of chemical structures and bioactivities of citrus-derived components using SERS barcodes

•Simultaneous characterization of structure and bioactivity using SERS barcode.•SERS barcodes exhibited 'identity' characteristics for 9 citrus components tested.•The intuitive method can detect as low as 40-60 ng of the tested components.•SERS barcodes showed the feasibility to predict bioactivities of bioactives.•Potential use of SERS barcode as a foodomics-like approach for identification.

Rapid detection of bioactive components in food has attracted great attention. Herein, we report a novel method through surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) spectra based barcodes for simultaneous characterization of chemical structures and bioactivities of nine citrus components for the first time. SERS barcodes were successfully used to characterize and discriminate all the components with high sensitivity down to 40-60 ng. Importantly, SERS barcodes exhibited the 'identity' characteristics. Beyond the molecular structure information, bioactivity information can also be read from the barcodes according to the bioactivity assay and structure-activity relationship. Hence, a simple and intuitive SERS barcoding approach used for simultaneous characterization of chemical structures and bioactivities was established. With a large database of barcodes, there is high potential that the SERS barcoding approach could be further developed to be a rapid, simple and effective foodomics-like approach for bioactive compound identification from a complex food matrix.